Rural Broadband Projects

Rural Broadband Projects

Rick Worthington
Rick Worthington
There is a pilot program, administered by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, for rural broadband projects.

600 million dollars will be used to bolster existing USDA loan and grant programs targeting underserved rural areas.

The ag department estimates that the investment will leverage $1 billion in new rural broadband projects.

Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue recently talked about the new pilot program. "The pilot innititive is a down payment of $600 from president Trump's infrastructure initiative this $600 he connectivity pilot program is an opportunity for Innovation and we want to see how many innovators in this room step up to say we can do it we're working on the rules for the program right now so when setting the rules we want to be sooner rather than later and Speedy but not Hasty we're going to be speedy and working as quickly as possible to establish eligibility and build-out requirements and set up administrator right."

According to the FCC, 24 million American households don't have access to reliable and affordable high-speed Internet, and 80 percent of those homes are in rural areas.

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